This invention comprises essentially a padlock of multiple-platen arms rotatably pinned together at one end and joinable together at the other by a lock cylinder with unlocking by relative motion of the lock cylinder. Of these elements, the lock cylinder may be any one of several such cylinders known in the art. Multiple platen lock bodies are known in the art, but not as the locking arms or shackle. Designs of rotating arms are known which employ differing locking means and which do not provide the flat form which is a feature of the present invention.
The padlock, properly speaking, has been designed for its application in all types of locks, but preferably for the locking and linking between them of the two facing butt edges of scissor type clorures, railings, and double doors; that is to say sliding doors that consist of two articulated parts that move in opposite directions for their opening, and gates or railings constructed with any type of profile. The simplicity of construction of the said padlock, as well as the well-studied design of the said padlock, make it a device of wide application because of its ease of closing and opening and because its manufacture proves to be economical, in addition to offering the great advantage that it can be made in different sizes, with the same dyes, since it is constructed on the basis of platens joined to one another, so that the greater or lesser number of such platens will determine a greater or lesser capacity of the said padlock.
Its construction is determined, as has been said above, by two groups of joined platens, those of each group joined to one another by rivets so that the said platens have an elongated and approximately rectangular shape whose longer sides converge towards an end which terminates in a semicircular shape, while the opposite end terminates in a quadrangular shape.
The two groups of platens, each one constituting an independent body, are connected to one another through the semicircular end by means of a fixed shaft of considerable diameter, on which shaft one of the bodies constituted by a group of platens can revolve. In this way the two bodies or groups of platens are arranged in parallel planes and separated from one another by virtue of the fact that at the end opposite to the articulation end, the group or body fixed to the shaft has another group of quadrangular platens joined and rivetted onto the quadrangular end corresponding to the above-mentioned body, so that a separation is made between the two main bodies that constitute the bridge or receptacle of the padlock itself, which receptacle houses the two parts or edges of the doors to be closed by the padlock in question.
In the quadrangular zone corresponding to the fixed body there is a pass-through orifice where an internal element is housed which element can be moved upwards and downwards with the purpose of leaving the mobile body free or blocked.
The internal element has its corresponding locking device integrated into an inner and eccentric body on which a pivot is joined, which pivot moves in an arched groove made in the main body of the internal element, which pivot, since it is eccentric to the body onto which it is solidly joined, will emerge to the exterior from the main body of the internal element when the key is turned, and will be housed in a channel provided in the inner wall of a cylindrical housing formed in the second body or mobile body of the padlock, in such a way that when the said pivot is housed in the said channel, the padlock will remain blocked. It is necessary to turn the key in order to unblock it, so that the pivot will be concealed and by means of an upward movement and the corresponding emergence of the lower part of the internal element from the housing in the mobile body, the latter body will be freed to be able to rotate and thus to effect the opening of the doors that the padlock closed.
In order that the mobile body may perfectly face the fixed body in order to effect the locking, the said body has a number of end stops which form a kind of slot in which the quadrangular end of said mobile body is perfectly positioned.
With the padlock constituted in this way, the locking of sliding doors that face one another by their butt ends is easily effected, since it is not necessary, in order to lock them, to do more than lodge the butt ends in the space formed between the fixed body and the mobile body, so that by simply effecting a slight degree of rotation of the key the pivot will be lodged in the previously mentioned channel, being perfectly blocked. To open it is not necessary to do more than introduce the key, turn it in the opposite direction, and the mobile body will be unblocked so that by means of rotation of the said body the two doors will be freed.
The said padlock offers a variant of embodiment which, without departing from the characteristics mentioned, performs the same functions. The said variant of embodiment consists of the fact that the two bodies are not fixed to one another by means of a shaft, but in their opening they form two independent and separable pieces. For this reason all the elements are the same with the exception that the mobile body, instead of being solidly joined to the shaft, rotating on it, is fixed to the shaft while the body that previously was fixed now has a semi-circular notch on its end for connecting it to the above-mentioned shaft in such a way that when opening takes place, the two bodies are separated.